Animal Testing

PETA presented one of its videos, aimed at the manufacturers of the different goods, using animals for testing their products. This sounds very nice, as they found those who are guilty, and their main call is to ignore, to boycott those producers, looking for alternatives, and all the animals would be saved that way. The layout of the video is constructed in the manner that first reminds us who we are dealing with – Johnson& Johnson, P&G, Clorox and Unilever. The authors used pictures of the animals that underwent the laboratory experiments, first-time product trials etc. to show the results of these experiments and the sufferings of the animals.

There are a few questions that arise after watching this video. PETA spends a lot of efforts to fight the companies, mentioned above. Analyzing this particular video, we find indisputable proof of their faulty activity, wrong attitude to the animals. In other words, pictures tell us their own story. However, close reading of the lines in the last seconds of the video makes us think of another aspect of this argument. All the companies, mentioned in the video, have a long history, millions of customers who trust the quality of their products and strong image that cannot be easily ruined with a few commercials of unethical treatment of animals. PETA is a huge organization, claiming to protect animal rights, this is a well-known fact. Considering the video that is discussed, we can argue if it was not created with a bit different purpose, e. g. ordered by the competitor-companies of those, mentioned in the video. PETA video creators address those who watch it, calling to quit purchasing the products of the famous companies and switch to different ones. This appears to be a primary message of the entire video. Except for the mention of the approximate number of animals, used in the experiments, the message to the audience appears to be a bit hidden, but quite obvious – buying products, manufactured by these companies is not good; people should start looking for something else. Besides, authors of the video tell us purchasing from the company leads to greater spending on mass killing of the animals, although there is no evidence provided to prove this fact. PETA argues about the facts that have no proven grounds, using the attack methods.

This video brings compassion to the animals that were used for the experiments; however, these events already took place, and there is not too much that could be done about it. PETA focuses on showing people the sufferings of the animals, while throwing in some really nice and glossy pictures of make-up, cleaning goods etc. They cannot win this argument and attract people who would support them by expressing their negative towards the possible supporters and followers. New strategy needs to be used in order not only to draw people’s attention to the problem, but to make them want to change something. Images of suffering animals only make us want to forget them faster, not to deal with saving those animals from sufferings. A good idea that could have been used in a video argument like this is a set of pictures of nice kittens, puppies, young rabbits, who are absolutely unprotected but also unharmed. People tend to protect something nice they have more than they are willing to do something about the past. A woman who would see this video with rabbit suffering from tests of her daily make-up would not be likely to start using something else as alternative – her skin cream was not made of a poor creature, simply tested on one of them for her safety. The same woman who would see a white, innocent rabbit and get a warning he would be mistreated or even killed during the experiment would go to the store and find an alternative to her current skin care product, as she would feel compassion to the living being and wish to save it.